The raid came at dusk, sooner than anyone had predicted.
Shouts ripped through the outer settlement as horns blared. Zephyr was finishing a late solo drill near the training yard when Aylin came sprinting toward him.
“Raiders! Northeast ridge — small force, fast. Commander wants every able body.”
Zephyr didn’t hesitate. He grabbed the practice spear and ran with her.
Aylin glanced at it once, then pulled a real spear from a passing soldier without breaking stride and thrust it into his hands.
“That one won’t kill anyone,” she said.
The added weight hit differently—denser, balanced for something final.
For a split second, it landed on him: this wasn’t training. Someone wasn’t walking away from this.
His grip tightened. He kept running..
They reached the outer perimeter just as the fighting started. It was exactly as he had warned in the strategy meeting — a small, disciplined group striking the narrow trade path behind the ridge, trying to create chaos and slip toward the supply wagons.
Ninsara was already there, a storm in human form. Her blade flashed as she cut down one raider, voice ringing clear over the clash:
“Hold the line! Push them toward the choke point!”
Zephyr moved with the defenders. He spotted the pattern immediately — the raiders were using feints on the left to draw attention while two men tried to slip through a gap on the right.
“There!” he shouted, pointing. “Two breaking right — they’re going for the wagons!”
Aylin heard him and charged. Zephyr followed, heart pounding. For a moment, his training showed. He thrust his spear forward, forcing one raider to stumble. But when the second man spun and swung a bronze axe, Zephyr’s reaction was half a second too slow.
The axe clipped his left shoulder, tearing through muscle and sending hot pain exploding down his arm. He grunted but didn’t drop. Instead, he drove his spear into the man’s thigh, dropping him.
The skirmish ended almost as quickly as it began. The raiders, realizing they had lost surprise, melted back into the growing darkness. Uruk’s defenders gave chase only a short distance before Ninsara called them back.
Zephyr stood breathing heavily, blood running down his arm and soaking his tunic. The wound wasn’t deep, but it burned fiercely.
Ninsara found him moments later. Aylin moved to speak, then stopped herself when Ninsara’s presence filled the space.
Ninsara’s eyes swept over the chaos before locking onto him. She took in the blood, the way he favored his left side, and the determined set of his jaw.
“You were right,” she said, voice tight. “Again.”
She gripped his good arm and pulled him away from the main group toward a quieter spot near a storage shed. A healer was already moving among the wounded, but Ninsara waved the woman off for a moment.
“Sit,” she ordered.
Zephyr lowered himself onto a wooden crate, wincing. Ninsara crouched in front of him, her strong hands surprisingly careful as she peeled back the torn fabric to examine the gash. The proximity, the scent of her sweat mixed with blood and dust, the focused intensity in her eyes — it all hit him at once.
“Even bleeding, you want me,” she murmured.
“I was curious if it would stay with you,” she added, almost idly.
“Yeah,” Zephyr exhaled. “Turns out it’s not that easy to switch off.”
Her hand lingered on his chest, just above the wound, feeling his racing heartbeat. For a moment, the world narrowed to just the two of them. Her thumb brushed slowly across his skin. Zephyr’s good hand rose instinctively, gripping her hip—just enough to test if she would stop him.
Ninsara leaned in, forehead nearly touching his. Her lips hovered dangerously close to his mouth.
“You fought well today,” she whispered. “Your eyes saved lives. Your body… still needs work.”
The tension was electric. He wanted nothing more than to pull her fully into his lap and finally close the distance they had been circling for days.
Then a shout cut through the moment.
“Commander! Two wounded need your word on moving them!”
Ninsara closed her eyes for a single heartbeat, jaw tight with frustration. She pulled back, the absence of her touch like cold water.
She stood, once again the unbreakable commander.
“Get it cleaned,” she said. “Things are about to start moving around you.”
With that, she strode back into the controlled chaos, leaving him sitting there — bleeding, aching, and more certain than ever that this woman was rewriting every part of him.
Zephyr leaned his head back against the shed wall and let out a long, shaky breath.
“Fuck,” he whispered to the darkening sky.
The healer crouched beside him, inspecting the cut with practiced detachment.
“If this is not cleaned properly,” she said flatly. “The wound will take more men than axes ever do. You included.”
Zephyr’s mouth tilted faintly. “So either way, something’s trying to kill me.”
The healer paused, her eyes lifted to him—measuring, not emotional.
“That is a poor way to speak of your condition,” she said quietly.
Then she looked away again, continuing her work.
For the briefest moment, something in Zephyr’s perception stuttered—like the world forgot its own sequence.
A blink of wrongness. Then it was gone before his mind could anchor it.
Zephyr exhaled slowly through the lingering edge of it, as if trying to shake something off that had no shape to hold onto.
Then he pushed himself upright, turning instinctively toward the command side of the field.
He spotted Ninsara near the command line and stepped in her direction, narrowing the space between them.
Before either could say more, Aylin approached at a brisk pace.
“Commander. Priests from the Temple of Inanna. They demand the stranger.”
Ninsara’s expression hardened instantly. “Demand?”
“They carry the seal of High Priestess Enheduanna.”